An Unfortunate Problem

On Wednesday my wife and I were involved in a collision with a deer on Highway 118 between Haliburton and Loon Lake. While we are fine, our car sustained several thousand dollars worth of damage and the deer languished a long time before dying. That injured and bleeding animal somehow dragged itself into the bush where the investigating OPP officer was unable to get close enough to end it's suffering with a pistol.

No doubt wolves will have found that deer by now.

Yesterday we came upon a lady with a small car who had just hit a deer West of the Loon Lake Road. The lady was fine, her car was badly damaged, and the deer died at the side of the road.

Both of these accidents happened near homes of people who are known winter deer feeders and where deer have to cross main highways to get to the food.

Two deer killed in two days and thousands of dollars of damages done to cars.

And there have been similar accidents in these places before!

There's something wrong here!

Despite a harsh winter, the MNR advises that the deer herd in this area is healthy. There is absolutely no need to feed the deer and they can survive quite well in the bush.

While deer are beautiful animals and are fascinating to watch, those are not reasons to entice them to a feeding area near one's home and in so doing force them to cross main highways, where accidents can happen.

As an aside, and while this article is not to address concerns over rising policing costs in Haliburton County; there are now police officers driving our highways and investigating vehicle collisions with deer. Something totally unnecessary if people would just think about what they are really doing and stop feeding the deer.

Since educational programs using our local media have been ineffective at stopping people feeding the deer; since people don't seem to want to stop feeding the deer; and since the problem is growing, perhaps it's time our elected officials get involved in solving this unfortunate problem.